Ad of the Day: Virgin

Branded entertainment often falls at the starting line for lack of a buzz-worthy hook—but Virgin seems to have a winner, in terms of publicity if not actual content, in making the first short film shot at 35,000 feet.

The film, Departure Date, a joint production of Virgin America, Virgin Atlantic, Virgin Australia, San Francisco ad agency Eleven, and Virgin Produced (the entertainment arm of the Virgin Group), premieres Monday night at the 2012 Los Angeles Film Festival. Check out the trailer and some behind-the-scenes footage in the video below. Mad Men fans will be excited to see Ben Feldman—aka Michael Ginsberg, copywriter of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce—in a leading role here, alongside the young Australian actress Nicky Whelan and some familiar faces like Philip Baker Hall, Luis Guzmán, Janeane Garofalo and Max Brown. The film itself, to be frank, looks exceedingly average, centered on a love story between Feldman and Whelan that isn't—or more likely, in the end, is—meant to be. "What if life handed you exactly what you wanted, and then took it all away?" says the voiceover—which doesn't exactly scream independent film.

Still, it's a fun idea—a $1 million experiment that Virgin, always a marketing pioneer, was happy to gamble on. Directed by Kat Coiro (who also shot the the feature film L!fe Happens), the film was shot in May over nine days and three continents during flights from Los Angeles to London, Dallas, Fort Worth and Sydney, Australia. It promotes Virgin's service from Los Angeles and will be featured as in-flight entertainment on Virgin flights. The company is also hoping to get it aired on TV, too.

Branded entertainment often falls at the starting line for lack of a buzz-worthy hook—but Virgin seems to have a winner, in terms of publicity if not actual content, in making the first short film shot at 35,000 feet.

The film, Departure Date, a joint production of Virgin America, Virgin Atlantic, Virgin Australia, San Francisco ad agency Eleven, and Virgin Produced (the entertainment arm of the Virgin Group), premieres Monday night at the 2012 Los Angeles Film Festival. Check out the trailer and some behind-the-scenes footage in the video below. Mad Men fans will be excited to see Ben Feldman—aka Michael Ginsberg, copywriter of Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce—in a leading role here, alongside the young Australian actress Nicky Whelan and some familiar faces like Philip Baker Hall, Luis Guzmán, Janeane Garofalo and Max Brown. The film itself, to be frank, looks exceedingly average, centered on a love story between Feldman and Whelan that isn't—or more likely, in the end, is—meant to be. "What if life handed you exactly what you wanted, and then took it all away?" says the voiceover—which doesn't exactly scream independent film.

Still, it's a fun idea—a $1 million experiment that Virgin, always a marketing pioneer, was happy to gamble on. Directed by Kat Coiro (who also shot the the feature film L!fe Happens), the film was shot in May over nine days and three continents during flights from Los Angeles to London, Dallas, Fort Worth and Sydney, Australia. It promotes Virgin's service from Los Angeles and will be featured as in-flight entertainment on Virgin flights. The company is also hoping to get it aired on TV, too.